THE STREET SINGER.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 851, 24 June 1910, Page 3

THE STREET SINGER.

MADAME CALVE'S APPRECIATION. PRETTY INCIDENT IN SYDNEY. A very pretty incident happened this week in connection with the visit of Madame Calve, the great singer, to Sydney, says the "Sydney Morning Herald." There is in Sydney a street singer who is often heard in the city of an evening, singing • without accompaniment, by name Madame Bel Collins. Fortune has not done all that it might for her, and of late her slender means had been more than usually straitened. And this is the story as she tells it:— "I happened to sing in Macquarie Street'on Wednesday night," she says. "It was the first time I had ever sung there, and I don't know why I went there that night, except that I thought that I might try new ground. ! "I was singing 'Love Mo and the World is Mine,' when a lady came up to me in a black cloak and slipped two half-crowns into my hand.' I looked up at her in astonishment. People don't do that sort of thing often; and at the moment, for somo reason, I . felt sure that it was Madame Calve, the great singer. I thought, the wonder of the great singer coining and listening to me. I am an English woman, and I hoard her years since in Covent Garden, in London. "The lady stood by my shoulder there whilst I sang. That night had somehow been a very happy one for me. There wore four or five gentlemen there, and I had got about lis., and I thought that I might go home. ' "Bnt when I finished that song the lady aslsed me if I would' sirig another. I sang 'Annie Laurie.' I don't believe I ever sang it so well in my life. She waited till I had sung it. I thought I would go home then. But she spoke to me. . . " ' Ah, Madame,' she said, ' what a sin to hear a beautiful voice like yours in this street.' "'But, Madame,' I replied, 'I cannot help it, you see.' You - are not Australian," she said. 'Ynu are English.' . > " ' Yea, Madame," I said, 'an Englishwoman.' "' You see me at the Hotel Australia at half-past 11 in tho morning,' olie said, as she left me. 'Ask for Miss Hulten,' she said. " 'But, Madame,' I protested, 'I am so shabby ' " ' Never mind,' she insisted. ' ' You como.' "Even though ■ she gave another name, I thought she was doing so because sho did not wish me to know. But I was convinced it was Madame Calve. I went to the hotel in the morning, and sent up a note to Miss Hulten to.say: 'Madame, by your re-, quest I havo kept your appointment.' Imagine my disappointment when the boy came downstairs and said: 'Miss Hulten says she doesn't know you.' I thought—Oh this is another disappointment. But I asked the boy to lend mo a pencil, and I wrote': 'You gave me five shillings last night in Macqnario Street.' "Directly afterwards a maid came downstairs —it was sho that was named Hulten—and gave me a sovereign. "' Madame Calve is very sorry that she is so busy—she leaves this morning,' she said, 'but she asks you to leave her your address. She says you have a beautiful voice.' "